OS X Mountain Lion 10.8.1 Update Released

OS X Mountain Lion has been updated to 10.8.1, the update is a general maintenance and bug fix release which includes assorted improvements.

The OS X 10.8.1 update can be downloaded through the Mac App Store, either launch the App Store directly or access it through the  Apple menu by selecting “Software Update”. The download is fairly small, ranging from 8MB to 30MB depending on the Mac, and you will need to restart the Mac for the Mountain Lion update to finish installing.

The official change and improvements list is as follow:

Resolve an issue that may cause Migration Assistant to unexpectedly quit

Improve compatibility when connecting to a Microsoft Exchange server in Mail

Address an issue playing audio through a Thunderbolt display

Resolve an issue that could prevent iMessages from being sent

Address an issue that could cause the system to become unresponsive when using Pinyin input

Resolve an issue when connecting to SMB servers with long names

Address a issue that may prevent Safari from launching when using a Proxy Automatic Configuration (PAC) file

Improve 802.1X authentication with Active Directory credentials

Though some individuals have reported improvements, there is no direct mention of the wireless dropping issues that some Mountain Lion users have encountered, and there is also no mention of the reported battery life drain that effects some Macs with 10.8.

All OS X Mountain Lion users are recommended to install the update.

Update: The popular “purge” command to clear inactive memory is broken in OS X 10.8.1 update, developers and users who use the command frequently may want to put off updating to 10.8.1 until a fix is available. Running the command issues the following error:Used “purge” command in terminal and received the following error:
[ERROR] The device-file for this operating system, ‘osx-12.1.0.xml’, was not found. An attempt to revert to a previous revision of the OS devise-file: ‘osx-12.0.0.xml’ has been made. Please file a Radar report with Apple, on the ‘CoreProfile’ component, version ‘X’.

Enjoy this tip? Subscribe to the OSXDaily newsletter to get more of our great Apple tips, tricks, and important news delivered to your inbox! Enter your email address below:

40 Comments

Updated to OS X Mountain Lion 10.8.1
Used “purge” command in terminal and received the following error:
[ERROR] The device-file for this operating system, ‘osx-12.1.0.xml’, was not found. An attempt to revert to a previous revision of the OS devise-file: ‘osx-12.0.0.xml’ has been made. Please file a Radar report with Apple, on the ‘CoreProfile’ component, version ‘X’.

I just tried using Purge and watched Activity Monitor. I had just over 2gb of inactive memory. Entered Purge and it dropped to 1.41gb of inactive memory (and got the error message in Terminal). Ran Purge a second time and had no drop in Inactive Memory (and got the error message again).

I ran purge on my 10.8.1 and it did go from 2.10 GB free to 4.08GB free. I did see the error though:

The device-file for this operating system, ‘osx-12.1.0.xml’, was not found. An attempt to revert to a previous revision of the OS device-file: ‘osx-12.0.0.xml’ has been made. Please file a Radar report with Apple, on the ‘CoreProfile’ component, version ‘X’.

Also, my mac has been going to sleep really often in 10.8 sometimes it tries to sleep when it’s copying data or other things. I think victor cajiao also said he has the same issue as me. Victor has been on a podcast recently on maccast three amigos.

I was able to re-enable my wifi b/g/n; whereas before the update I had to downgrade it to g only. Custom MTU no longer required, although I had to run the diagnostics tool twice and restart for it to pick up my network properly.

Wifi upgraded back to b/g/n at 300Mbps, whereas I had to put it into g only mode for this Macbook to work. Customized MTU no longer required here. Took a restart and a couple of diagnostics for it to pick up my network information properly.

@B I actually never had wifi issues personally, but I am now noticing that wifi consistently fails to connect to my network properly at login. I have to shut it off and turn it back on to get a connection

@B
I can confirm that is not the case, and I am so very disappointed. I have never had any wifi issues before, but after the ML upgrade it sucks. I am able to use the wifi connection for a couple of minutes, then it slows down and then it stops.

And I have tried everything that you can imagine even upgrading the router’s firmware though it was a problem that came when upgrading.

Did you try the MTU solution? I dropped mine to 1400 and it stopped my wi-fi problems with my home router. Never had an issue with work routers or friends though, seems dependent on connection and maybe even band.

I have the same issue and disappointed to hear it is not resolved by Apple, very disappointed.

I tried all the suggestions of MTU and new location and even router firmware update but in the end the issue appears to be 802.11n 5ghz band. I disabled it on my router and have not had any dropping. This to me is not fix but a bandaid and stinks.

[ERROR] The device-file for this operating system, ‘osx-12.1.0.xml’, was not found. An attempt to revert to a previous revision of the OS device-file: ‘osx-12.0.0.xml’ has been made. Please file a Radar report with Apple, on the ‘CoreProfile’ component, version ‘X’.

I have the same issue. It’s not really a big problem. The “purge” do free up memory when invoked. Working and verified. The error message states that it uses an older version of the configuration file. This is an xcode-cmd-tools issue i think.

I too get the level 3 syslog error. Since level 3 errors are not critical, I helped the ‘purge’ command along by doing, in the above directory:

sudo ln -s osx-12.0.0.xml osx-12.1.0.xml

The soft symbolic link the above command creates stops the error. I think this is _probably_ safe to do and forget about for the following reasons:

the purge program falls back to the linked file anyhow, though complains on screen and in syslog(Console)

the symbolic link is non-destructive, and should a real 12.1 file be installed with proper credentials, it will overwrite the link

if one were to have a 12.1 file in place already, the ‘ln’ command would simply say ‘file exists’ and exit non-destructively.

I’m not sure why purge references a file that may or may not exist, nor why it treats its absence as an error, when that may or may not be the case. I don’t think it’s reason to put updating ML on-hold, in any case… it is _not_ a critical error.

I have a much bigger need for 10.7.5 on my wife’s computer (which is a year older than mine and won’t take Mountain Lion). 10.7.4 broke her resolution to only extremely large and extremely small, and it’s a real pain to use. Testers say that’s been fixed in 10.7.5 for a month or more, but Apple won’t tell us when it will be available for customers.

Well, purge works yet throw the message but I’ve another rhetorical question — WTH do we have to use purge at all?! Isn’t there suppose to be Memory Manager like in any other OS? What about that fabulous Grand Dispatch or whatever they call it? I’m finding this ridiculous being forced to run purge from time to time just making OS X working just normal instead of sluggish crawling through.